sahr2001 - Health Systems Trust

15 • Voices of Parliamentarians
dilemma for female parliamentarians based in Cape Town when their families
were in another province.
“There is nothing that the legislature is doing for women, in terms of caring for
them and children.”
“I don’t think it really does (anything) at all ... no creche, you have to hunt to find
the ladies’ toilet.”
Accountability and the Media
Communication and Community Involvement
Communication with constituents is of paramount importance to those
interviewed. Not only do parliamentarians have a statutory responsibility to
those who give them a mandate, they themselves believe this relationship to
be fundamental in terms of their responsibilities. A number of those
interviewed report directly to ratepayer bodies or branch committees, but a
more direct form of communication is visiting constituencies or carrying out
site visits.
“We go on site visits, members are delegated ... what we do is what we call
provincial visits, where delegates are tasked or deployed to the various
provinces ...”
Public hearings are a further and seemingly common form of informing the
public about pending legislation as well as a means for eliciting public opinion.
“You must remember that when we do public hearings it involves communities,
public hearings mean (we) go into communities (and) tell them that this is
what the minister is planning and are you satisfied with it, and they would
make their input.”
“We have public hearings from time to time ... and we then go and talk to the
different stakeholders and the communities.”
The use of parliamentary publications was cited as a means of communication
but more common was the use of the electronic media. Some national
parliamentary discussions and debates are captured live on TV, in particular
the NCOP.
“We just recently had a programme on SABC whereby a chairperson, on behalf
of the committee, will go and give a report on the committee and the public
can ask questions on the spot.”
267